With a wood cutting and splitting device, i.e. a wood splitter, a log is cut to measure and the blocks cut to measure are split into firewood. The wood splitters are usually operated manually, and the user interface may be a joystick, for instance. The operator feeds a log, which is on a roller conveyor, for instance, into place for cutting, guiding it with the user interface, whereafter the log may be cut off with a blade or circular saw of the wood splitter. Upon cutting, a wood block falls into a V-shaped groove. The wood block in the groove is split such that the operator controls a hydraulic cylinder of the wood splitter, for instance with a pedal, to push forward a piston that pushes the wood block in front thereof towards a splitting blade. When the piston is pushed all the way to the splitting blade, the wood block is split into pieces, and the piston returns to its initial position.
The operator may use cutting and splitting of the wood splitter consecutively. Thus, it is possible to reduce a risk of fault situations and, in the case of fault situations, to reduce damages. To speed up the operation some wood splitters may have two operators. One operator controls the cutting of a log and the other controls the splitting of wood blocks. The wood splitter's operating speed and reliability in operation depend, however, on the skill of the operator or operators.